Current world events seen through the clarifying lens of the LORD's inerrant prophetic word. The Lord's Word proclaims a series of 'latter days' events leading to the second coming of Jesus Christ and the establishment of His Kingdom upon the earth in this generation.

Thursday, June 5, 2014

Global SITREP C7-14: Intel Brief for June 2014

5 June 2014: The current situation on planet Earth is pretty much the same as it was the last time a global war was in the making. Ours is a polarized world as the above image depicts, with the world powers moving their chessmen within the various theaters of kinetic conflict. This is completely consistent with the prophetic view expressed in the Bible prior to the 70th Week, and nothing that has not already been discussed on Eschatology Today in recent years. However, an Intel Brief for June 2014 to update everyone on global maneuverings is called for at this time.

In Ukraine low intensity conflict rules the day and the night in the eastern part of the country between the government in Kiev and Russian-speaking so-called "separatists" led by Russian special forces and military intelligence commanders taking their orders from Vladimir Putin in Moscow. So far and overall, absent the direct involvement of the bulk of Russia's main air and land forces, Kiev's military forces are inflicting tremendous damage and casualties on their "separatist" adversaries in engagements of various sizes and durations. However, Russia's aggressive actions in Ukraine, as is the nature of special operations forces, are very stealthy and continue unabated, but at some point heavy forces will be necessary to forestall total defeat.

I continue to assess that the probability of a full-scale Russian military invasion grows with every "separatist" set back or defeat in combat; a war of attrition is not in Russia's interest by any measure. Countries on the periphery of Ukraine have used this low intensity period to strengthen their forward deployed and reserve battalions and brigades and place them in a near-war posture. This is true with NATO in the West, especially in Poland; Finland and Sweden in the North and with other nations to the South, such as in the not fully resolved Russian war of aggression against the Republic of Georgia.

In Georgia the new government is actively preparing for another Russian invasion. However, unlike their experience against Russian armored forces in 2008, the next war here will cause Russia's military forces to be bled profusely. Georgia has used the past 6 years to create the most combat hardened force in the Caucasian region, a force that if unleashed today would be more than capable of dislodging the twenty percent of its territory still occupied by the Russian army (South Ossetia and Abkhazia). What is not widely known is that Georgia's entire army has been rotated through and thoroughly trained in the past five years on the battlefields of Afghanistan alongside and in support of American forces. In short, the Republic of Georgia has a new army, an all-volunteer, top-notch and very battle-hardened professional army that can robustly defend its territory or strike the Russian bear a severe blow in his hind quarters should he suddenly move towards Israel. With the exception of the Polish army, Georgia now fields an army larger and more capable then most of the larger members of NATO. Keep an eye on Ukraine, but know that Russia has a much bigger potential problem with its expansion ambitions to the south. In 2015 this Georgian army will be fully integrated into the NATO Rapid Reaction Force of 25,000 troops.

In East Asia there are great rumblings among he military forces of the "kings of the East." Mainland China is actively provoking the Vietnamese with naval skirmishes in the South China Sea of late - several Vietnamese commercial fishing vessels have been sunk after being rammed by Chinese warships escorting a sea-going oil platform, and Chinese PLA armored units have run up onto the border with northern Vietnam. Chinese and Japanese air and naval forces have been squaring off against each other in the maritime area just north of Taiwan. In Thailand martial law was followed by a military coup d'etat which makes another southeast Asian nation less than stable in a region poised for war. And then there is North Korea with the prospect of a dual nuclear weapons test (with Iranian participation) and more launches of long-range, nuclear-capable missiles.

In Central Asia, from Pakistan to all the former-Soviet republics further north to the Uighur part of western China, Islamic jihadism is spreading like a wild fire and is the greatest threat to the entire region. Continued upheaval here is a given conclusion; war and the misery it brings on a far greater scale is inevitable.

In Africa, from Nigeria to the Horn of Africa, north to Egypt and Libya we find the northern half of the continent a place where war, rampant terrorism and insurrection reign supreme and where southern African nations (OAS armies) have joined their military forces with the expeditionary forces from NATO and the US in combat operations against Islamist militias such as Boko Haram, Al-Shabaab and Al Qaeda in the Maghreb (AQIM). Yes, the king of the South is flexing his muscles as well.

And last, but never the least, there's the Middle East powder keg. From the Eastern Mediterranean littoral to the Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz, and on down to Yemen, ongoing combat operations and maneuverings also perpetually rule the day and the night. Most concerning is the the Syria war which is now right up against Israel's northern frontier as it is up against Jordan's northern frontier. Iraq is a basket case and full-scale war between Sunni and Shi'a rages there in everything but name. Then there's the Iranian nuclear program, which is about to have yet another North Korean-hosted test as mentioned above. This program continues as the Obama Administration pretends to be negotiating a deal with an Ayatollah who just recently reiterated for the umpteenth time his plan to destroy the "great satan" America and then the "little satan" Israel.

Notice how the globe with the chessmen in the image above looks more like a traditional anti-ship mine than it does a chessboard. Any one of these regional conflicts has the potential to set the world on fire with the war that our Lord Jesus Christ prophesied about in the Olivet Discourse that would sweep the world like the flood of Noah's day. How many millions of lives were snuffed out in that flood? Unknown, but the coming flood of fire will take an exponentially larger number of souls.

Now is the time to double-down on your witness to those who have yet to receive the Grace of God through Christ our Lord. I believe all these things point to the very imminent yet completely unknown day and hour when the Harpazo will take us in less than a nanosecond leaving many of the unsaved we know and love behind to endure even more unspeakable horrors in the wrath of the 70th Week.

If you read the sum total of Bible prophecy for these last days... you'll "get it."

If you read the exchanges in the previous post about Israel's current spiritual condition you'll "get it" from that also.

You wrote: "...what the hell are the Israelis waiting for?"

How about this quote below for a hint. This is the Lord Jesus Christ speaking to the ancestors of modern Israel, and modern Israel, for the most part, are in the exact same spiritual condition as those ancestors were when Jesus spoke these words. There is not one iota of difference between the spiritual condition of Israel as it was in 33 AD or as it is 2014 AD.

"But I know you, that you do not have the love of God in you. I have come in My Father’s name, and you do not receive Me; if another comes in his own name, him you will receive. How can you believe, who receive honor from one another, and do not seek the honor that comes from the only God? Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father; there is one who accuses you — Moses, in whom you trust. For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?"

So, "what the hell are the Israelis waiting for?"

Yes, exactly!

They are literally waiting for hell incarnate! They are waiting for the one whom they will receive and accept as their Mashiach.

And when it comes to Jeremiah 49:34-39 pay real close attention to the fact that nothing in that prophecy says or has any relationship to modern Israel.

It says that GOD will "break the bow of Elam." It says that GOD will bring "the four winds" upon Elam "from the four quarters of heaven (shamayim - i.e. the visible sky)."

No reference to Israel here at all. Zero, Zip. Nada.

So, if you are waiting for Israel to strike and destroy the Iranian nuclear threat, you are waiting for the wrong event to occur.

......and Mark is not the only one. There are many people, both prophecy scholars and secular people waiting for Israel to strike. I must confess, there is little that I'd like more than to see Israel openly defy obama and the eu, the un, and a host of other nations by taking out the Iranian threat. I would like to ask you this, does Saudi Arabia have a part in the destruction of Elam?

Of course, lot's of people are waiting; I had been waiting for the same thing for many years and until until recently when I began to study it once more in greater detail word for word.

However, and again, what does the only specific prophecy about this judgment God brings upon Elam/Iran specifically say on the matter?

Is it okay to put prophetic words in the Lord's mouth that He did not have the prophets say?

He did not name any specific nation.

What the prophecy specifically says is that God is responsible for the breaking of their primary offensive military power and that He brings it upon them from the sky and from every direction.

That's all there is.

This prophetic phrase about the four winds from the four corners of heaven is repeated many times in the Bible and in many different prophecies, and each time it is quite literal.

The best interpretive statement that can be said is that God does this via His own Divine and Sovereign way (as He did against Sodom and Gomorrah), or that He uses nations to the north, east, west and south of Iran as the sword brought against them to break their offensive military power, and also scatter much of the population all over the globe.

Anything else has to be considered as being a purely presumptive or a purely speculative interpretive view.

You know Sean, Iran has been having a LOT of little earthquakes lately AND just recently had two days of massive sand storms that killed a few people. We have the sand storms in AZ every summer but the only people that die are people on the road that slow down and cant see...

Yessir, the Lord is in full control of His Creation. If He wants to open up Bushehr like a can of sardines, well, I think an earthquake would be a very simple way to do it, and thereby send the population fleeing hither and yonder as outcasts just as Jeremiah's prophecy indicates.

In verse 38 it does also appear that the Lord intends to execute His version of "regime change."

Also, we can pretty much assume that the Lord God almost certainly had Israel in mind when He inspired Jeremiah to write that Elam/Iran would be chathath (i.e. shattered, broken, dismayed) before their enemies.

I tend to think that would be a very powerful message from the Lord to His chosen people in these last days.